


A Dance and a Memory

by CiaranthePage



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Dancing, Domestic Fluff, F/F, POV Rose Lalonde, POV Second Person, Post-Canon, Rainbow Drinker Kanaya Maryam, Vampire Bites, idk i just wanted to write about them being happy you know
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:27:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26317945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CiaranthePage/pseuds/CiaranthePage
Summary: Rose and Kanaya haven't had a fancy date night, recently, so they decide to get dressed up and dance at home. An old song comes on to wrap up the night in a way some would argue is cliche for a rainbow drinker romance.
Relationships: Rose Lalonde/Kanaya Maryam
Kudos: 23





	A Dance and a Memory

**Author's Note:**

> as of writing this note, it's about 1:51 am. i stayed up until 6:30 am last night ~~and i've been having to ration my meds until monday yikes~~ so instead of working on my other projects my brain just provided me the image of rose and kanaya all dressed up fancy and posing in a very vampire-like pose  
> as the tags suggest, this is post-canon but the specifics of timeline and circumstance are up in the air, so you can make them up in your heart  
> no real editing bcus i like my wlw oneshots full of the pure emotion, lol; it's mostly mushy but kanaya does (spoiler) bite rose, it's just only a little bit and not in very much detail  
> i hope you enjoy!!

It’s nice, to dress up like this. You haven’t had a chance to go out together recently, not anywhere that requires glimmering gowns and loudly clicking heels and enough hairspray and make-up to doll up a third member to your dates. You adore small get-togethers, with your friends or just Kanaya, the ones in comfortable hoodies and soft skirts and simple hellos and goodbyes, but they are not shining under a thousand scattered crystals of lights, they can never be twirling your wife under chandeliers that used to make you nervous, though they also don’t try to. There are no live orchestras in coffee shops, though you’ve come close. Tennis shoes on pavement are not heels on marble floors, holding hands is not gripping her waist while each of you dares the other to take control, a gentle walk through the park is not a choreographed back-and-forth across a checkerboard arena.

Tonight you’re not under chandeliers, the floor under you is no marble checkerboard, and the music that guides you is playing from an old record, but you’re both dressed up, and Kanaya is glowing, literally and figuratively and in the haze of your imagination. You’re dancing together, her hands in yours and all arms wrapped around your waist, your heels against the hardwood floor of your wide foyer make almost the same sound that you’re used to. Kanaya is smiling, warm and soft, the smile you love the most because you see it when she’s most content, when she’s purring lightly against your back, when her eyes are almost closed and you can just see where the jade you got to watch grow in. She loves to press that smile against your shoulder and leave just a little stain behind, just enough for you to run your fingers over the morning after before you have to get ready; tonight is no different, and the jade you see out of the corner of your eye makes your heart swell each time you remember it.

“Rose,” she says, maybe a question, maybe just to hear your name in her voice.

“Yes, Kanaya?” you respond.

She presses a kiss to the side of your head, chuckling under her breath. You would, too, but chuckles don’t come easily to your mouth when it’s already occupied by what some may call a “lovesick grin.” The music turns over, some sort of mechanism in the record player automatically putting on another record. You don’t see which one it is; the records you two have is something of a… diverse collection, from old dance tunes to songs from a future you only know in passing. At least one of them is just Dave’s music that he put on a record for you, and when you see the red label you assume that’s what’s about to come on.

Except it’s not. You still the lazy circles you had resorted to when the music got slow and your feet got tired, listening intently. You’re not sure if it’s your imagination, because whether Kanaya’s pusher still works as intended (or at all) is a subject no one can seem to agree on, but you swear you feel its beat pick up against your back.

You have yet to learn the name of the song.

But you remember where you first heard it.

You remember because it was one of the first films you and Kanaya ever watched together, while you were both still a little unsure. You remember because it was a rainbow drinker film, one of the ones with slightly shorter titles -- an older one, Karkat had remarked -- one about two outcasts coming together in their mutual forbidden passions. You remember because you two have danced to it before, in other nights like this or ones with parties that you’d mutually agreed to stretch on just a bit longer, because oh how Kanaya misses seeing the sunrise, even if the diurnal lifestyle hadn’t been as much of an adjustment for her. You remember because it makes the side of your neck light up, sensations upon sensations running up and down the muscles.

Kanaya remembers, too. You know that as surely as you know anything, more than you know anything.

“We should dance,” you say, a glance up to meet her eyes. You do not specify what dance entails. You’ll let her pick.

“Like this?” she hums, and she guides one of your arms out, your back still to her chest and one arm still around your waist. If her head is tilted down, just slightly, you pretend not to notice.

The way her fangs seem just, just so slightly more pronounced in her grin makes yours wider. You like to play this game. Vampire and visitor, she jokingly called it once after a brief cultural exchange. Vampire and visitor, except the visitor wore her finest low-cut gown with none of its underthings in the pouring rain to greet the vampire at her castle.

“Lead the way,” is how you express the train of thought.

And she does, gentle as ever, as strongly as ever. Dancing this way is difficult, but you’ve had practice, practice not-quite-waltzing with some of the feet positions shifted, practice twirling each other out and colliding in the same way you started, practice leaning your head just so, giving an invite for kisses to your neck and the slight nicks of fangs against old, faded scars. The beat of your heels against the floor matches the timing of the song, and you don’t know about Kanaya, but the movie plays against the back of your eyelids, the two lovers locked in something that Kanaya swears was dancing but to you looked like an elaborate duel. And you let it play, your eyes carefully lidded to enjoy not only the film but the sensation of Kanaya at your back, of her hands in yours, of the way your dress moves against your skin and her breath on your neck caresses a part of you you like to save just for her.

The song winds down, down, down. You know what’s next. Of course, you do, you both do, and you open your eyes to meet your wife’s. The jade in her eyes is narrowed, not as much as when she’s pushed to near-starvation (you would never let that happen to her again, not here where you have the resources) but enough that you know what she wants.

You practically dip yourself in time to the song, leaning into the arms at your side, your outstretched, grasped arms elongating the path to your neck, your head lolled to the side, Kanaya curled over you, supporting you, putting you at her mercy.

She is the vampire in her castle, the rainbow drinker in her cave. But you are the visitor who knows exactly what lies beyond the forbidden threshold. A visitor who, perhaps, wants to be much more than a figure passing through.

The bite on your neck is brief, it is loving, it is heavenly, it is the sensation of disconnection and unification all at once. Kanaya’s tongue on the wounds sends a shiver up your spine. And the kiss you steal from only slightly bloody lips is as final an ending to your dance as an orchestra playing a final, echoing note in unison.

**Author's Note:**

> as usual, if you enjoyed, i'd love to hear from you! i enjoy every comment, kudos, and share i get, and i hope you have a lovely [insert word appropriate for your timezone]!!  
> if you want to talk to me about my work, see what else i get up to, just chat, whatever, find me on tumblr at [thegempage](https://thegempage.tumblr.com/) or on twitter [@achillopal](https://twitter.com/achillopal)!!


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